Tuesday, September 02, 2008

Palin Hearts Federal Earmarks

by tristero

Sarah Palin, we hardly know ye! But I suspect that unless she is forced out by the McCain campaign, what we've learned about her in the past 24 hours or so - her membership in a radical secessionist party; her position helping to run Stevens' 527, and so on - is only the tip of the iceberg.

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin employed a lobbying firm to secure almost $27 million in federal earmarks for a town of 6,700 residents while she was its mayor, according to an analysis by an independent government watchdog group.

There was $500,000 for a youth shelter, $1.9 million for a transportation hub, $900,000 for sewer repairs, and $15 million for a rail project -- all intended to benefit Palin's town, Wasilla, located about 45 miles north of Anchorage.

In introducing Palin as his running mate on Friday, Sen. John McCain cast her as a compatriot in his battle against wasteful federal spending. McCain, the Republican presidential candidate, hailed Palin as a politician "with an outstanding reputation for standing up to special interests and entrenched bureaucracies -- someone who has fought against corruption and the failed policies of the past, someone who's stopped government from wasting taxpayers' money."

McCain's crusade against earmarks -- federal spending sought by members of Congress to benefit specific projects -- has been a hallmark of his campaign. He has said earmarks are wasteful and are often inserted into bills with little oversight, sometimes by a single powerful lawmaker.

As for her specific anti-pork claim, the one about her opposition to the Bridge To Nowhere, the inimitable Bob Somerby eviscerates it:

PALIN (8/29/08): I told Congress, Thanks but no thanks on that Bridge to Nowhere.

From that statement, citizens get the idea that Palin high-mindedly “told Congress” to pull the plug on that much-derided bridge project—to stop wasting all that tax-payer money. That isn’T close to what actually happened. But your career liberal player are simply too dumb—too undisciplined—to explain it. And so far, the mainstream press hasn’t done better.

Duh. Palin was elected governor in November 2006. One year earlier, in November 2005, the “bridge to nowhere” earmark ceased to exist.

Emphasis in original.

There are reports of GOP teams swarming north from the lower 48 to do the proper vetting of Palin St. John McCain, so sure of his gut instincts, couldn't be bothered to do. Meanwhile, crotch-sniffing reporters will be turning the state upside down to uncover other salacious scandals. They don't have to; it's besides the point.

Sarah Palin's record speaks for itself. She is a far rightwing nut who has abused government power for personal reasons. Repeatedly. She was a member of a group calling for secession from the very country she now wants to lead. She is a bald-faced liar. She is as ignorant of science as she is of American history. She may be well-liked in Alaska, but even there they think it's ridiculous to imagine her a heartbeat from the presidency.

It has been said we should be careful not to denigrate Palin's very real achievements. It is not I who denigrate them, but John McCain who, under pressure from the right, picked a not-ready-for-primetime player.

Indeed this is all about McCain. This is about his erratic, bizarrely irrational decisionmaking. This is about his own extremist conservatism, championing not only coat hangar abortions for the poor - bad enough - but even opposing funding for contraception services. This is about the huge extent to which St. John McCain is an abject servant of the "Religious" Right, an amalgam of extremist political pressure groups aligned with genuinely anti-American secessionists and theocrats. People, it's real simple:

McCain - not Palin, not Gustav - is the real disaster.

UPDATE: You may have heard that Palin lawyered up for her corruption investigation. Now we learn Alaska taxpayers are footing her lawyer's bills. And it's also been confirmed that she was lying when she claimed to cooperate fully with the investigation. Her lawyer is doing his level best to delay the proceedings so the investigative report comes out after the election, not before as it was scheduled.